Sinn Féin has been raising with Government the need to tackle the growing power of so-called cuckoo funds for years. We proposed measures to end the sweetheart tax deals that these funds have been gifted by Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael, but, time and again, Government has voted against these proposals.

Last week, the Taoiseach came to the Dáil and expressed his shock that funds are snapping up family homes in bulk. He said that this was a new development and it was not Government policy. Of course, none of that is true because it is Government policy to attract these investment funds which it does by giving them cushy tax arrangements, which see them pay virtually no tax at all. Last weekend we learned that it is also Government policy to invest in these funds. Money that should have be used for affordable and social housing was being used to push ordinary buyers out of the market, to push up house prices and rents. Far from being shocked, the truth is the Taoiseach knew what was happening and his claim that it is not Government policy to support these funds is absolutely bogus.

Ordinary working people will struggle every day to save for a deposit, they will pay extortionate rents, they will find themselves locked out of home ownership, and, all the while, these investors snap up homes from under their noses and their Government is boosting these funds with their taxes. You could not make it up.

The Government knows it is faced with enormous public anger in the face of a housing emergency. Yet the measures we have heard reported in the media seem to be a case of far too little, far too late. If the Government does not set the stamp duty at a high enough rate, it will not stop these funds buying up homes ahead of first-time buyers and others. For example, the Tories in Britain set the rate at 15%. They discovered even that rate was too low and they have had to raise it again.

If the Government's proposals exclude apartments, we will also have a big problem there because apartments are family homes and cannot be excluded. The reality is that half of all homes built in County Dublin last year would be exempted under the proposals speculated on in the media. Six out of seven homes in the city would be exempted.

The Government cannot wave the flag of surrender and abandon whole communities to investment funds not just in Dublin city but in Poolbeg, Cherrywood, Clonburris, Cork city and beyond because this would consign an entire generation to paying extortionate rip-off rents long into the future, unable to buy their own homes as these funds increase their profits.

Stamp duty needs to be increased. The Government needs to understand that these funds will spread the cost of this over their long-term investments. The Government, therefore, also needs to tax their profits. It must shut down all the sweetheart tax arrangements enjoyed by these investment funds. These deals, designed by Fine Gael and continued by this Government, need to be brought to an end. That is the only way we can ensure that this generation of workers and families will stand any chance of securing an affordable home. Will the Taoiseach outline for the Dáil and, more importantly, for those caught up in this housing nightmare what measurements his Government will now bring forward to stop these funds?

First, I have to repeat to the Deputy that the Government’s fundamental aim is to provide unprecedented funding to facilitate the largest social housing programme in the history of the State over the next five years. That is the anchor of the Government’s housing programme. We want to provide 50,000 social homes over the next five years.

In addition to that, we want to provide affordable homes through a variety of initiatives which the Minister has undertaken, not just in shared equity, or indeed where the State is now going to get involved in a new scheme to support State-built affordable homes, but also by way of the first-ever national cost-rental scheme, which is being introduced by the Minister, Deputy Darragh O'Brien, in addition to a range of other initiatives. The bottom line is that we are not building enough houses or apartments in this country to meet the needs of ordinary people and working people. The Government does not believe that funds should be competing with owner-occupiers or first-time buyers in buying up houses that have already been built. They should not be competing with first-time buyers for badly needed properties. We believe in supporting first-time buyers and owner-occupiers. That is why we have expanded the help-to-buy scheme. Sinn Féin opposed that scheme, which was availed of by 22,000 homeowners. Deputy McDonald seems to believe ordinary people should not get the help-to-buy scheme at all. She opposed it. Sinn Féin also opposed the Land Development Agency Bill, the shared equity scheme, and 16 out of 21 housing developments on Dublin City Council. These are homes that could have been built for ordinary working people.

The flaw in Sinn Féin’s proposition is that it sees no room at all for the private builder or the private sector. The State is now the main actor in housing - of that let there be no doubt - in terms of building and in terms of supporting agencies. We also need to get going as well. This has nothing to do with funds. This is to do with getting private builders to build privately so that we can get the level of housing we require. We need up to 400,000 new houses by the end of this decade. That is not all going to be done by the State on its own, yet Sinn Féin seems to think it is the only option.

The proposals that the Ministers, Deputies Darragh O’Brien and Donohoe, will be bringing forward will deal with the issue of investment funds competing with first-time buyers and owner-occupiers. Further discussions will take place later on some of the proposals. We will need the support of parties in this House to facilitate the passage through, most likely tomorrow, of the decisions that the Government will take on this matter. We want to see the legislation through tomorrow. I hope we can count on the support of Sinn Féin in that regard.

The Government perspective is very clear. Housing is a number one issue. We need to provide more and more houses. We need more supply. I do not see in the Sinn Féin policy any substantive, coherent approach to increasing that supply. Our Government’s entire effort and objective is to solve this problem. Sinn Féin’s objective is to exploit it for its own electoral and political gain. I see nothing constructive coming from that party, either at local or national level, in terms of getting houses built at a significant scale out there.

The reality for the Taoiseach is that he caused this problem.

He caused this crisis and he is sustaining it. The reality is that, as a consequence of his policy, these investment funds come here. Not alone do they come here and snap up family homes from under the noses of home buyers but, in fact, his Government invests in these funds to the tune of hundreds of millions of euro. His Government's policy allows these funds, some of them the biggest residential landlords in the State. I will give one example. IRES, one of the largest residential landlords in the State, turned over €75 million in income from rental. It paid no tax. Not one cent of tax was paid on that. That is the Taoiseach's policy. That is what he has brought. That has brought hardship to people across the land. I asked him about these funds specifically because this needs to get sorted out. I invite him to stop the spoofing and the posing and to commit to the following: stamp duty at 17%, corporate tax on the profits on these big funds and residential landlords-----

Time is up, Deputy, please.

-----and capital gains to apply. End the sweetheart arrangements and make absolutely sure that protection is afforded to every residential unit. Houses, apartments, duplexes-----

Time is up, Deputy, please.

-----all of them are homes and all of them need to be kept away from these vultures, these cuckoos, these funds that the Taoiseach-----

Deputy, please. The time is way up.

-----has invited in to wreak havoc in the lives of our citizens.

With the greatest respect, I did not invite anybody in because I was not in government when these funds were invited in. The Deputy knows that but she keeps up the great political lie that Sinn Féin keeps articulating in terms of trying to pretend that Fianna Fáil was in power for the last ten years when it was not. We are now in government with Fine Gael and the Green Party for the last ten months and we have identified housing as a major priority and capital is needed in the country to provide housing and apartments. The Deputy and Sinn Féin are doing the spoofing because they are perpetrating a great pretence that Sinn Féin and Sinn Féin alone through the State can provide every single house that will be required for the next number of years and every single apartment. The Deputy knows that is not the truth. She also knows it is not the truth to say that Government is involved in every single decision making process within the Ireland Strategic Investment Fund, ISIF. Its funding has been designed to try to get certain projects that would never otherwise have happened over the line and get them built in terms of a rental market.

I thank the Taoiseach. The time is up.

We need a home ownership market, we need a social housing programme and we need a rental market as well, but I see nothing in the Deputy's proposals.

Time is up.

Why will the Taoiseach not answer the question?

I see nothing but bluster and empty rhetoric because, when it comes to it, what does Sinn Féin do on Dublin City Council and other councils? It opposes projects that could have delivered 700 houses in different localities around this city.

Never mind my party; you're the Taoiseach. The Taoiseach has no answers.

Taoiseach, please. Deputy McDonald, please.

It is complete hypocrisy how you perform on the housing programme.

The Taoiseach has no answers for an entire generation. There are no answers, only spoof, from the Deputy from Cork.

Deputies, please.

We might expect answers. It is called Leaders' Questions. We expect answers from the Taoiseach.

It is, but we cannot dictate the nature of the reply------

That is why the taxpayer pays his salary.